http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/09/25/business/chinet.php

China has built its own version of an ultrafast next-generation Internet network that promises to reduce the country's dependence on foreign companies, the state news media reported Monday.

The China Education and Research Network has linked 167 institutes and departments at 25 universities in 20 cities through the Internet Protocol Version 6, China Central Television reported.

The current Internet is run by Internet Protocol Version 4, which is limited by the numbers of Internet addresses that can be created and lacks advanced security functions, the report said.

The new protocol can work at speeds of 2.5 gigabytes to 10 gigabytes of information per second, around 100 times current Internet speeds, the report said.

Researchers in the United States, Japan and South Korea are also building IPV6 technologies, which are expected to gain "significant global traction" by 2010, it said.

According to IPV6 information posted on Microsoft's Web site, IPV6 and IPV4 will be used simultaneously over the coming years as Internet operators and home computers gradually take on the new technology.

IPV6 is expected to be able to handle an infinite number of Internet addresses, offer better security and be more compatible with mobile phones and hand-held computing devices, the Microsoft site said.

Chinese researchers received government approval to research the new protocol in 2003 with the goal of helping domestic companies build competitive hardware for the next-generation Internet, The China Daily said. Internet routers and other equipment for the IPV4 system are now mostly made by American companies like Cisco Systems and Juniper Networks, the paper said.

Five Chinese telecommunications operators, including China Telecom and China Mobile, are building IPV6 networks, with some expected to begin trial runs by the end of the year. Chinese research institutes and manufacturers are also working to standardize and commercialize IPV6 applications and hardware with the hope of making Chinese technology companies more competitive globally, the paper said.

Lenovo reports overheating

Lenovo Group, the Chinese personal computer maker, said it was investigating a case in which a Sony-battery- powered Lenovo notebook computer overheated this month and began smoking and sparking, Reuters reported from Tokyo.

The malfunction, whose cause is unclear, happened with a Lenovo ThinkPad T43 on Sept. 16 at Los Angeles International Airport, but no one was injured, a Lenovo spokesman in Tokyo said.

Dell and Apple Computer last month together recalled almost six million Sony batteries, saying that they could produce smoke and catch fire. The Lenovo notebook that became overheated was using the same type of Sony battery that was a target of Dell and Apple Computer recalls, the Lenovo spokesman said.

A spokesman for Sony said the company was cooperating with Lenovo in investigating the overheating but added that Sony had not determined that the notebook computer had been equipped with a Sony battery.